Memories of a Stranger
by MaraudersInFedoras
Summary: "Professor R.J. Lupin." A stranger in the compartment of the Hogwarts Express. Unknown and exhausted. Who would have thought that the memories he possessed were not as irrelevant as the trio had guessed. Memories such as these never pass as time does. One-shot. Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and everything penned by J.K has been written in italics.


**A/N: So, I'm back from a loooong hiatus. Kick-starting my fanfiction with a nice, 'happy' one-shot. Would love some reviews as a welcome back present…anyone? **

_**Memories of a Stranger**_

"_Who d'you reckon he is?" Ron hissed, as they sat down and slid the door shut, taking seats furthest away from the window."_

"_Professor R.J. Lupin," Hermione whispered at once. _

Remus Lupin did not recall the moment when his nervous state of consciousness had abandoned him. Perhaps it had been the soothing rocking motion of the Hogwarts Express, perhaps the exhaustion that had turned to weighting every limb and every movement in recent days leading up to the full moon. Or maybe it was the familiarity of his surroundings; that nostalgia that clung to the carriages. The musty smell of the seats, the scent of excitement and anticipation coursing through the length of the train heightened only by the youthful laughter and various pops, bangs and whistles of students trying out spells they had been unable to practice through the six week summer. Poofs of coloured smoke wafting down the hall.

It had been all too easy to sink into unconsciousness, dissolve his wakefulness into the nostalgia of the train ride.

Fourteen times he had ridden that train, fourteen times; each progressing from childish name calling and giggling to boasting and laughing, to oaths and jibes. The first time he had rode it he had been alone, the memory he could barely pluck out from its brothers and sisters. He had found a carriage full of other nervous first-years and had barely spoken a word with fear somehow he might give everything away, the fear that he might slip up, that one word might spark suspicion. However, his second journey found him accompanied by three friends, the best friends he could ever have imagined.

He could almost believe they were with him just then. If he drifted away from his senses he fancied he could feel Sirius's shoulder moving against his, the sound of his laugh as he made some perceivably witty comment to James. Maybe he could just hear Peter's tiny snorts of laughter at Sirius's antics or feel the slight breath of wind on his skin at a jerk of a wand or the flutter of a snitch. If he allowed his senses, his grip on reality to loosen he could imagine they were there with him, sat across and beside him as if nothing was wrong, as if nothing had changed, as if this next adventure he was embarking on was no more than another year of school.

But it was a dream. No matter how far he allowed himself to go into his subconscious he felt the weight of reality bearing down on him, waiting to crush him as soon as he resurfaced. However, right then, he wanted to sleep, to keep his friends alive and free just for one more minute, one more hour. Sometimes he fancied he heard James's voice in the indistinguishable chatter sounding on the edges of sleep. It made his very heart wrench to hear it, the temptation to hold onto it and the terrible hope it brought unignorable. Just for another hour, let him be at peace.

Strange. Like a stone dropping into a quiet pool, like an unexplainable noise in the dark, like a lull in the noise of a crowded room; Remus's senses felt shift in the atmosphere. The world around him at changed, somehow. There was something wrong.

There was no concrete knowledge with which to hold as evidence to this but something in Remus, some instinct he did not even realise he possessed, dragged him cruelly back into reality. It was a slow process. Just like that he acknowledged Sirius's shoulder was no longer against his own. There was no lightness, no excitement, no anticipation. Instead, his eyes opened onto darkness, his ears onto confusion and anxiety. The smell of nervousness and fear hung over the carriage.

Teenagers were muttering in the darkness, squeals of pain and fear rippling through the dark. It took his mind seconds to catch up with what his ears were perceiving. Frightened, scared teenagers, stumbling about in the dark.

Then through the confusion a voice sounded, a voice oddly familiar, a voice that sent chills of both fear and longing through him.

"_Not here, I'm here," _

The voice was hurried, nervous in the midst of all the confusion. Young. It unsettled Remus more than anything in the past few minutes had been able to.

"_Quiet!"_

His single word cut through the chatter as it had once cut through his friend's. He heard them still. Breathes intake. He felt them relinquish control of the situation to him, an unspoken award of leadership handed to him in an instant. As it was supposed to be.

He forced himself to crush the hope that had sprung up at the sound of that voice, forced himself to tighten his senses, widen them, taking in the fact that this was not the only compartment in which this was happening, the fact that the train had drawn to a halt. The fact that it was now bitterly cold, icily.

A whispered incantation and flames burst into life in his hands, lighting up the faces of the teenagers around him. Five of them. Each of their eyes turned on him expectantly, their faces pale in the flickering orange light spilling from between his fingers.

"_Stay where you are."_

They obeyed without a word and with great effort he manoeuvred himself to his feet, awakening every ache, every shooting pain in his limbs. The shivering flames in his hand fell across each scared face as he did so: a bushy haired girl, a round-faced boy and another boy and girl both with flaming hair.

But there was one face, the face of one boy that made his movements still, his hand freezing as if stomach turned. That was a face he recognised very well indeed.

It must have been less than half a second for which he paused, urgency tugging at his brain, the need to drop whatever ridiculous hope that he was clinging to and discover the root of the problem, restore order as was his job. But, recognition had been sparked. He knew that messy hair, he knew those skinny limbs, the glasses perched on his nose reflecting the flames in his hand, the small stature, he recognised every inch of the person before him. Had it not been for the green eyes centred up on him he would have considered himself to still be entangled in his dream. He didn't need to see the scar on his forehead to know this boy's name: Harry Potter, James's boy.

All too quickly the illusion snapped. (Lily's eyes, he found himself recalling with clarity as if it had only been yesterday he had last seen them.) The compartment door was sliding open. (He looked how James used to, about fourteen.) A cloaked figure stood, illuminated by the flames in his hand. (That was the year before they worked out the enchantment to transform themselves into animagi.) The teenagers were gasping, suck in air that seemed thick with the cold. (James was dead. It was a brutal fact, true but brutal.) The creature drew a hand from the folds of its cloak, its rattling breath sucking the intense fear from its surroundings.

Remus felt it wash over him, fear gripping his heart. Wiped away were the memories of the train-rides, the laughter, the antics. A gaping hole was left where he had once felt them so keenly. No. Now, different memories rose to his mind on the crest of the creatures work. He remembered with cold clarity the funeral, the grief, the tears. He remembered how Dumbledore's eyes could not meet his as he relayed the news. Three friends…two dead, one lost. He remembered the crushing agony in his chest, the feeling like he had lost his balance, the disorientation, the feeling that part of himself had just shrivelled away to nothing, like everything in the world was suddenly rendered meaningless, like he had lost the very centre of his existence. There was nothing now. No reason to be alive, no reason to even try.

The feelings were not new, they had been there for nearly twelve years, eating away at him. Sometimes worse, sometimes easier to bear, but never gone. He felt it when he locked himself away for his monthly transformation, he remembered it when he lay sleeplessly in whatever bed he could find, he remembered it when he stood in the middle of a crowd alone, he felt it every-time he saw an old school friend. But he had never felt it as potently as he did then. As if the twelve years had only enhanced the feelings, not numbed him to them as he had formerly believed. They rose raw and painful inside him, tearing at his chest with grief.

A gasp sounded from behind him, loud in the frozen silence.

Remus found his eye move from the figure to its source and his heart jolted once more in his chest. The boy, Harry, was writhing in his seat, eyelids pressed together, his limbs jerking as he slid down in his seat, consciousness abandoning him.

The Dementor seemed to be centring everything on him, its head bent towards Harry's.

The knowledge, hit Remus with the force of a stunning spell and a thrust his hand into his robes for his wand without hesitation. He felt embarrassed, ignorant. What right did he have to want to give up? What right did he ever have to allow his grief the hold over him that it did? He never had the right. Lily, James and Peter were dead and Sirius was a wanted criminal, the target of the creature before him, but that did not give him any right to dissolve into the sadness, to allow himself to be crushed by it. The Dementor itself had bypassed him in its eagerness for the grief that Harry held inside him. When James's son could live with the pain then so could he.

He did not allow himself to feel the pain any further. Purpose, coursed through him, driving his limbs, driving his words:

"_None of us is hiding Sirius Black under our cloaks. Go."_

When the Dementor still refused to move he did not hesitate, raising his wand before him. It did not even tremble. Harry appeared to be completely unconscious by that point, head lolling on the floor of the carriage.

He knew the incantation well, a muttering, a memory; the familiar silver light. As the Dementor was propelled away from them out of the compartment his friend's shone in his mind's eye: he saw them again, young and grinning, at his side. He fancied he almost heard James's whisper in his ear:

"Nice one, Moony…"

It brought a smile, however fleeting to his lips. It perhaps was the first smile he had had in months, maybe even years.

His eye fell on Harry, now swarmed by his friends as they tried to shake him awake. James was not quite dead yet. He was alive right there, in the messy hair, and skinny stature, in the love he obviously had for his friends, in the grief he unknowingly shared with Remus. He would live on and upon that realisation Remus felt hope, the first hope he had felt in twelve years. After that, the pain felt just a little easier to bear.

**See that little box just below, yep right there, a little writing box. Write something in it, hit post and you might just make my day **


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